Page 52 of The Wedding Forecast

HAYLEY AND LUKE are holding hands, staring into each other’s eyes, saying their cute vows, and, damn it, I’m choked up looking at them. I’m definitely in danger of crying. I look at the sky, at the ground, out into the crowd, trying to distract myself before a tear betrays me. The ceremony is outside, with Hayley and Luke standing under a canopy of beautiful trees and a flower arch. Hayley’s veil is fluttering slightly in the soft breeze.

My gaze lands on Bianca, and that does momentarily ground me. She catches my eye and smiles, and I smile back before looking quickly away. We are not going to be friends. I picture Hayley having a baby and turning to Bianca for advice. No. Hayley and I are supposed to be pregnant together, going through it together, like Mum and Bobbi did, our babies becoming best friends like we are. We have a legacy to uphold.

But I am acutely aware that there is this enormous gulf in our lives and I am slipping further and further behind. In every way. Hayley owns a house. That was the first big difference. Owning a three-bedroom house in a nice suburb of Melbourne before thirty in this economy is like owning a private jet. The two things are equally beyond my reach. Hayley’s father, Gary, is wealthy, and Luke’s family is rich rich, which explains a lot of it, but that doesn’t change the facts.

I have savings but I am still years away from a house deposit. I have HECS debt and my super is okay but not great. I am fine. I never wanted to be rich. I never actually worried about money until Joel and I broke up. For so long I’d coasted on the idea of having both our incomes. The panic hit about a month after our breakup, when I realised that I truly had lost all the security I’d had. I felt sick. What had I done? How had I let myself become so reliant on the idea of someone else? We got together in our last year at uni, so I had never really navigated adulthood on my own.

I needed to go back to some kind of learning-to-be-an-adult school and get my sea legs. There must be a halfway house, for getting out of long-term relationships, for those of us who emerge like unsteady foals, blinking in the sun. I hadn’t changed a lightbulb in eight years. Joel always did that. I had to quickly make a list of chores he did so I could be sure I knew how to do them. Even simple things. He took the lint out of the dryer, I needed to remember to do that now so I didn’t cause a fire. The real problem was that Joel was very domesticated, he was very organised and clean. He was very particular. He liked things a certain way, and when you’ve been in a relationship with someone who was the dominant one in terms of domestic tasks, it takes a lot of time to readjust. It was also a revelation. Oh, I don’t have to do things that way. I can wash sheets on my own schedule. Joel is not actually morally superior to me because he liked the dishwasher stacked a certain way.

The thing was, he was so confident about things, and I felt so messy. I was stumbling around in the world, and he was smoothly and carefully making his way in a determined path, so I just started walking on the path behind him, in his footsteps, without realising it.

Looking at him now, standing across from me, behind Luke as I stand behind Hayley, I wonder how he’s doing. He doesn’t like surprises, he doesn’t like things not going to plan. The baby news must have knocked him sideways. I can imagine the pressure he is putting on himself, already, to support his new family and have everything perfect for the baby. There will be so much he can’t control and he will struggle with that. He looks at me and I give him a small smile. He smiles back. It feels strange, to be together in a wedding ceremony. It could have been us getting married.

I catch Mac watching me, and immediately feel flustered. My skin prickles with the desire to have his hands touching me. No, stop. You aren’t allowed to think those kind of thoughts at the altar in front of a priest—well, makeshift outdoor altar and celebrant. Still bad though.

We’re at the pointy end of the ceremony now, thankfully, because my shoes are so uncomfortable and I’m worried I will sweat on my dress. Hayley and Luke kiss, and are pronounced husband and wife, and they walk down the aisle. Joel and I link arms and follow them, with Mac behind us. I thought everyone would be looking at Joel and me and thinking what a scandal it is, two exes walking down the aisle together, but, of course, that’s not what is happening. No one is looking at us at all. Everyone just wants to congratulate Hayley and Luke.

We are swept into a crowd of well-wishers.

15

THE SPEECHES ARE over. Mine went well. I think. I got a decent amount of laughs, and I saw Bobbi wiping a tear during my emotional section at the end. When I first stood up, I thought about my hands, and my eyes met Mac’s and I swear he could tell what I was thinking, and he winked at me, which should have been off-putting—I am not usually pro-wink—but Mac’s wink was confident, quick, sexy. It matches his voice, somehow.

Joel’s speech was fine. He had practised it to within an inch of its life, I could tell, but it was heartfelt, if a bit stilted. Bobbi’s speech was very sweet but far too long. Hayley’s father’s speech went off track from the very beginning and he never course-corrected, and he made a joke about the Spreadsheet that didn’t land. Luke’s father laughed at his own jokes well before he got to the punchlines. Overall, there were no disasters. The buttons, the speeches, the ceremony—all the hard bits are done.

Now there’s just one more hurdle. A moment I have only just realised I am dreading. At every wedding I’ve been to, after the bride and groom do their first dance, the DJ or MC then welcomes other couples onto the dancefloor to join them. And as I watch Hayley and Luke dance, I realise that is what is about to happen here, and I feel intensely aware that I am not part of a couple. Which is fine, I can wait for the initial first moment of couples dancing to end and then the dancefloor will break up into informal groups. It’s just the idea of Joel standing up and walking out there to dance with someone else, while I remain seated, that I need to mentally prepare for—that little heart skip of pain.

The song ends, and there it is, the DJ welcoming other couples onto the dancefloor. I can see Joel and Bianca standing up together, my parents holding hands as they walk that way, Jean following Bobbi.

I weave my way through tables, heading out of the marquee altogether. I’ll get some fresh air outside until the dance is over, then I’ll join Hayley on the dancefloor. I see Mac on my way out, standing near the bar. I have been avoiding being alone with him most of the day, although I can’t even pinpoint why.

That’s a lie. I know why. What if I throw myself at him again? I can’t risk my mouth being in the vicinity of his. I can’t risk hearing that voice. There’s a limit to my desire. I have dignity.

He reaches out and touches my arm as I walk past him.

‘Hey,’ he says.

I pause.

‘Dance?’ he asks. He’s smiling in a way where his eyes are crinkling at the corners, and even this little detail I find irresistible.

‘You don’t need to dance with me,’ I say. I am assuming he’s standing all the way back here because dancing isn’t something he enjoys.

He takes my hand, and tugs me gently towards him. ‘I’m a good dancer,’ he says. ‘Trust me.’

I hesitate for a moment, and then I walk with him onto the dancefloor.

I expect him to be joking and to be actually a terrible dancer, but he holds me with ease, skilfully directing us around the floor.

‘You really are good at this,’ I say.

‘Did you think I was lying?’ he says.

‘Yes,’ I say, laughing a little.

He grins at me. Those crinkling eyes again. ‘I had to do some ballroom dance training, for a role once.’

‘Well, I’m impressed.’